by Nicole Auerbach, USA TODAY Sports

by Nicole Auerbach, USA TODAY Sports

GREENSBORO, N.C. - The Atlantic Coast Conference tournament will remain in Greensboro through 2015. That much is set in stone.

But in light of expansion - adding Syracuse, Pittsburgh and Notre Dame to the ACC beginning next season - the league could consider a new location for its conference tournament in the future.

Much of the speculation has centered on the possibility of New York City. With the Catholic 7 (new Big East) expected to keep its league tournament at Madison Square Garden, Brooklyn's new Barclays Center could be a potential venue.

Before anyone gets too carried away with this, it's important to remember this is all hypothetical - and also way in the future.

At this point, it seems likely that the ACC will continue to adhere to the philosophy it has relied on with its tournament all these years: Greensboro will host most of the tournaments, but every few years, the event will bounce out to another area of the ACC footprint (like Atlanta last season). Greensboro is where the conference was founded and remains home to the league office. So even if New York is chosen to host the tournament, it would likely be one of the "bounce out" sites, not a mainstay.

The Atlantic 10 is currently holding its tournament at the Barclays Center, and its deal with the arena lasts through 2017.

Proposals were submitted to the ACC before last September (well before the latest waves of conference realignment) to host the event during the 2016-21 time frame. Madison Square Garden and the Barclays Center did not submit proposals, but that does not mean the tournament cannot end up there. The ACC schools will ultimately make that decision; they have meetings scheduled for April and May, and the location of future tournaments is expected to be among the topics discussed.

"My guess is in listening to the athletic directors (that) the next eight or 10 years will probably look somewhat similar to the past decade in which we had the tournament in North Carolina as its home base, in Greensboro and Charlotte, and bounced it out periodically to other parts of our footprint," Swofford said. "We've got some attractive opportunities."